Just Had To Ask
by Mizzy
Summary: An oldschool TaitoYamachi. (Set in 02.) Fed up of people dancing around the subject, an irate Yamato explains how he'll tell the truth... if they just ask him outright... (Slash, boyxboy.)


**Just Had To Ask**

A Taito/Yamachi fic by Mizzy von Mizzington, esq.

**----------- **

It's been _way_ too long since I played in the lovely Taito sandbox, so here I am again, up to my neck in buckets and spades and all ready to get sand in my trainers. 

It's a pity none of the sand actually belongs to me, sigh. And a pity that some people who like to _watch _the sand don't think that male sand ought to be lying next to male sand. However cute and cuddly those grains of sand happen to be. 

(Translation, now I'm out of this ridiculously extended metaphor, is that Digimon does not belong to me, and this is slash - a.k.a. male on male boogying-on-down stuff - so if that ain't your thang, go away and read a nice, soporific Sorato, there's a sweetheart.) 

Takes place somewhere during the beginning of 02, mainly because when I try to juggle all eleven Japanese digidestined _and_ their various cutesy digital monster companions, I get confused and start naming characters weird combinations, like KabuIzzyMegaWoppaTronMon. Strange thing is, at 2 AM, that looks vaguely genuine. 

----- 

**Just Had To Ask**

**----- **

"Seriously. What can we learn in school that we can't learn out _there_." 

Yagami Taichi, seventeen now, sun browned from a little _too_ many hours spent outside playing a little _too _many different sports, flapped his arm around in a vague manner. One Ishida Yamato leant back on his own hands, watching Taichi's gesture with a hazy expression of bewilderment crossing his unflawed features. 

"Out _where _exactly?" Yamato scratched one nose, and squinted at Taichi's wildly flailing arm. "The football pitch?" 

"Well, _yes_, but no, not really," Taichi managed, scowling as he tried to process what he just said. Yamato's laugh didn't help things. Taichi flashed his best friend a dirtier scowl and stopped flinging his arm around in its near approximation to one of Birdramon's dives. "I mean, _yes_, of course you can learn a lot of stuff on the football pitch." 

"Like the ability to duck," Yamato broke in, irony lacing his tone as he looked briefly at Taichi's ribs. Taichi clucked in annoyance, and held his ribs gently. 

"It's not my fault I didn't see that ball coming, and you perfectly well know you were distracting me," Taichi grouched back, frustrated. Yamato beamed innocently, as if to say the smoke bombs at the team practise were not thrown by him at _all_. No siree. "_Anyway_, just think of the football pitch as a- as a microcosm of the real world. Sure you can learn football theory. You can learn how fast a football will rebound and at what angle -" Taichi spoke this words with a lot of venom, referring to last term's annoying Mechanics lessons in Maths, which involved a whole lot of equations which turned out to be rather inaccurate anyway "-and you can learn angles to kick at. But until you're out there, you don't know whether you can do it. You can have the theory down pat, but not be able to actually _do _it." 

"You know, right from your weird metaphor, I've seen one thing you can only learn in school," Yamato reflected sunnily. 

Yamato's rather placid countenance, the barest hint of a smile on his pale face, lengthened blond hair trailing down, obscuring his eyes, long limbs stretched outwards in the careless sprawl in the knowledge that summer was coming soon, struck warning bells within Taichi. The blond was planning something evil, but Taichi, for the life of him, couldn't figure out what. 

Taichi eventually settled for a plain answer, figuring he could resort to the tickle method, or the fight method, to soothe Yamato's arrogance after a snippy answer. "What?" Taichi asked dubiously. 

"How to use the word microcosm, and use it _correctly_." Yamato's voice held a distinct hint of the timbre of their teacher's monotonous voice. 

Taichi blinked. Where was the bitter response? The mud down the trousers? The ice-cold hand on the back of his neck? "Huh?" 

"The word is _macrocosm_, Taichi," Yamato said, unable to hide the smirk. "A microcosm is something a little smaller." 

And _there_ it was. Satisfied that all was right with the world again, Taichi went for the tickle method. Wrenching his body into action rapidly was the only way for him to get a decent tickle in before Yamato could retaliate, and Taichi did this, diving for Yamato's knee. Yamato let out his usual high-pitched - _girlish_ Taichi would inevitably end up describing it - shriek, and grabbed out for the region Taichi was ticklish, just above his hip. 

Five minutes later, the tickling match ended, with them both covered in grass stains and still yelping like hyenas. 

"Moron," Yamato managed eventually, keeping his hands where Taichi could see them, flat out on the grass. His body was twisted slightly to one side to do this, and Taichi noted in satisfaction he'd managed to pull out Yamato's shirt. 

_Not so impeccable now, Ishida_, Taichi thought with a smirk that somehow must have crept onto his face. 

"What's so funny, Yagami?" Yamato demanded as Taichi hurriedly placed his similarly mucky hands flat out on the grass. 

Taichi opened his mouth to speak, took in the grass in Yamato's hair and the tasteful streak of mud marring one of Yamato's cheeks. He resisted the urge to giggle. Taichi was normally expected to go into class messed up, whether from some fight or some sport he'd been playing. Yamato, however, normally entered every class perfect. No piece of clothing out of place. 

"_Taichi_. I swear. If you've managed to get me in a mess, I'll-" 

"Naa, Yamato," Taichi lied with a serious expression. "Just tuck your shirt in, you'll be fine." 

Yamato visibly relaxed. "I thought it was something worse, like you."

"Me?" Taichi blinked. 

"_You_," Yamato repeated, sarcasm clearly in his tone. Taichi scowled again. "You've got grass in your hair." 

This almost set Taichi off laughing again. Unfortunately, Yamato had known Taichi long enough to be able to interpret the way Taichi's shoulders shook as the sign that Taichi was going to laugh. 

"Taichi, _c'mon_, what's so funny?" 

Taichi thought rapidly, let out a snort courtesy of the real reason, and lied again. "You squeal like a girl, Ishida." 

Yamato sighed, tensed as if he was going to punch Taichi, then relaxed, settling for a light punch to Taichi's upper arm. Taichi made as if to retaliate, and thought better of it. It was still close enough to lesson time to ensure Yamato didn't go to the bathroom and see Taichi's handiwork. "Every time," Yamato sighed. "Every time you find it so amusing. Why?" Yamato turned his head upwards, and held his hands upwards, pleading. "Why, God, why??" 

"Eh, maybe we can find out in the uselessness called _school_," Taichi grouched. "Upwards and _avante_, Ishida." 

"Up yours, too, Yagami," Yamato returned, willfully misunderstanding. 

"Ow, Yamato, you wound me deeply," Taichi said insincerely. "Lead on, madam." 

"You're this close to getting your butt smacked down," Yamato promised, holding his thumb and forefinger close together in front of Taichi's face. 

Taichi beamed innocently. "You promise?" 

Yamato muttered something under his breath. 

"Pardon?" 

"I called you a _Berline_," Yamato said with some satisfaction. On Taichi's confusion, Yamato smirked again. "It's German. You look it up." 

----- 

"I still can't believe you called me a doughnut," Taichi was grouching, four hours later, as they were sat in the park, with a very bizarre picnic courtesy of his mother, a slightly more responsible one courtesy of Kido Jyou and a tin of biscuits courtesy of Yagami Hikari's new stalker/new digidestined leader/goggle boy Motomiya Daisuke, along with a nearly full complement of Japanese digidestined. 

Yamato threw Taichi a very dirty look. "I can't believe you let me go into class looking like that," Yamato said bitterly. His tone rose to mimic his classmates. "'Woah, Ishida, don't you _wash?'_ 'Mr. Ishida, I don't appreciate you setting a fashion trend in my lesson.' 'Now you even look like a pansy girl, Ishida.'" Yamato scowled as some of the others giggled. 

"You've got to admit, it was pretty funny." That was from Yagami Hikari, Taichi's little sister, who was showing some of the others something on her digital camera. Hikari had seen it because it was her job as register monitor, and she'd entered Taichi and Yamato's class moments after they did, and been privy to the reactions. She'd even got a picture of Yamato, replete with grass strands and mud streak. 

"The only thing I have to admit to," Yamato said prissily as he dissected one of Mrs. Yagami's coconut and banana sandwiches, "is that your brother is a moron." 

"And that's something everyone knows anyway," Taichi said, mock-despondently. 

"You know, that was pretty rude." Sora looked up from her creation courtesy of Mrs. Yagami - which looked like some kind of meat and jelly roll - and looked at Yamato. "Calling you a pansy girl." 

"Who was it?" Takaishi Takeru - Yamato's little half-brother - lifted his head from his position next to Daisuke, who had plonked himself between Takeru and Hikari moments before the picnic had 'officially begun.' 

"Planning to go beat them up, eh, little brother?" Yamato reached over a large bowl of rice and custard, knocked one of Takeru's cloned hats to the ground and ruffled his half-brother's hair affectionately. When he pulled his hand away, they all noticed the grass now decorating Takeru's hair, and declined from saying anything. 

"No," Takeru replied, his cheeks burning as if that had been exactly what he'd been planning. "I'd probably be inclined to get Patamon to digivolve into MagnaAngemon, and get him when they're asleep to drop their beds up the top of a tree, or something, though."

"Very evil," Daisuke commented. "I'm impressed, Takaishi. Right up there with the Digimon Emperor." 

Hikari turned to the sometimes-slow goggle boy. "You can stop being mean right now, too. I, along with a lot of people, am not impressed by people who are mean." 

Immediately, Daisuke sat upright, looking left to right like a demented rabbit on speed. "M-m-mean? M-me? Never! I mean, never from now on! Right now! From right now, I'm going to be nice to everyone! Yeah. Like, um, Takeru! Nice lot of grass in your hair, dude." 

Everyone laughed as Takeru brushed grass furiously from his hair and clamped his hat down on the unruly golden strands. "Thanks, Daisuke," Takeru said within clamped teeth, somewhat less mollified when Hikari tipped him a wink. He smiled back gratefully. Hikari could be a little minx on occasion, and he was glad of it. 

"Speaking of Patamon, where is he?" Kido Jyou looked up from where Izumi Koushiro had been showing him his new C++ programme (a revolving 3D model of the digiworld) and tilted his head quizzically. 

"Mimi and Miyako have them," Iori piped up from his rather more sensible sausage roll. "I think they're giving them baths and a make-over." 

Hikari groaned. "Miyako promised that they just wanted to play," she complained, before shrugging reflectively. "Eh, it's not my arms that'll be scratched if they try and put a ribbon on Gatamon." 

"That's the spirit," Taichi remarked cheerfully. 

"Speaking of spirits, Yamato, you never answered Takeru's question." Sora leaned forwards on her knees, deciding a pot of Mrs. Yagami's salad couldn't be strange. She picked it up and glanced at the others. They were all looking at Yamato expectantly now to hear the answer. There was no way Yamato could dodge the question. If he ran, they'd just persist until he did. 

Yamato sighed, distinctly uncomfortable that he'd been cornered. He examined a ham and raisin sandwich as if it was the most interesting thing in the entire world. "It was just Yutaka. From the band." 

"Isn't he supposed to be your friend?" Instantly Taichi sat more upright, his dark brown eyes flashing with protective instincts towards his best friend.

"They are my friends. It's just-" Yamato trailed off. "Look, I don't think this is-" 

"Something you can talk to your closest friends about?" Koushiro, his laptop temporarily closed and balanced on his crossed legs, finished the question, sarcasm lacing his dry tone. Koushiro could be more wickedly sarcastic than Yamato, if only because no one expected it to come from Koushiro. 

Yamato sighed. "Well, you know, there's that rumour going around." 

"Which rumour?" Daisuke queried. 

"The one that you're gay?" Takeru snorted. "Come on, Yamato, no one believes that one." 

"Hm." Yamato shifted slightly, a little uncomfortable. "Anyway. We've always said to each other that if they want to know anything, we ask outright. Too many bands split up because they don't voice their problems. But the thing is - they won't come right out and ask the question. They keep pussyfooting around the subject. Dropping hints. Saying I'm girlish. Injuring my wrist so it'll go floppy. Hanging up pictures of half-naked guys in my locker." He smiled once, quickly. "Akira even tried playing footsy with me under the table in Physics to see if I'd respond." 

"So, if they just came out and asked, you'd tell them?" Taichi put his head on one side, abruptly lifting one hand to shield himself from the bright sunlight filtering through the overhead branches. The June sun was beating down on them, and as it was nearly the solstice it would go on shining long after they'd all gone home. 

"Yeah, of course I would," Yamato said. "It's a promise I make. I made it to all of you, too." 

"We made it right back, if I remember correctly," Sora said softly, nodding in agreement. 

"So, well, are you?" 

Everyone turned to look at Daisuke, whose mouth was half full of Mrs. Yagami's Vegetable, Marmite and Peanut Butter pie, who had asked the question. Daisuke blinked and accidentally sprayed pastry all over them. "What? It's a legitimate question. There's got to be something that started the rumour off." 

"Probably the fact he _looks_ like a girl?" Takeru suggested, ducking at the sudden cold swiftness that glinted in his brother's eyes. 

"I'm asking outright. Yamato, are you gay?" Daisuke put the food down onto a paper plate. 

Yamato smiled once, wolfishly. "Courage deserves you, Daisuke." Daisuke beamed in appreciation of the compliment "And the answer's yes," Yamato added softly, almost as if it was an afterthought. 

Takeru blinked, and then folded his arms. "Gah, anything to prove me wrong, eh?" He grinned suddenly, fiercely, at his older brother, as if to say it was okay by him. Takeru looked a little startled that he didn't know, but that was a combination of the fact it really was a surprise and his own feeling that somehow he should have known already. 

"Really?" Hikari bent forwards, interested. "How remarkable." She settled back onto her knees, looking thoughtful. Yamato inwardly winced. He knew how curious Hikari could get. Like the time Taichi wouldn't tell her what a condom was. _Ow-eee, am I glad Takeru got all that info on the playground_, _'cause they're both as bad as each other. _

"It's disappointing, really," Sora remarked wryly. Hurt flashed across Yamato's face for a second. Sora reacted quickly to explain herself, not wanting him to hurt for what she'd said. "For the female population." 

Yamato visibly relaxed. "Ah." 

"For the male gay population too," Taichi said, his voice hitching slightly. He glanced apologetically at Yamato. "You look like a girl, can cook and are a rock musician. You just don't do anything for the stereotype." 

Yamato punched Taichi in the arm for the girl statement. "Moron." 

"Idiot," Taichi flipped back.

"Nothing changes," Koushiro muttered, looking up to Jyou, expecting a nod of agreement. The blue-haired boy was abruptly quiet. "Jyou?" 

Jyou blinked, the effect intensified by the boy's glasses magnifying the startled expression. "Oh, gosh, you must completely think I'm having a bad reaction to this. No, I think I just figured out how to do that Pure Maths question on second differentiation…" He giggled sharply, embarrassed. "I don't have an allergy to. Um. Boys who like boys." 

"Wow, Jyou has discovered one thing he doesn't have an allergy to. I really gotta mark this in my diary," Taichi said sarcastically. Jyou pulled a face at Taichi in response. 

"Have you always been gay?" That was from Iori. As he was so small, they almost kept forgetting he was there, and wouldn't have known if all the prune juice hadn't kept disappearing. Iori flushed at the sudden attention, somewhat unaware if was partly because they were so ashamed they'd forgotten he was there. "I'm just curious," he quickly explained. "It's not something that we talk about much at home." 

Yamato leant backwards on his hands, crossing his legs and thinking about his answer. His golden hair glinted in the sunlight, giving him an almost ethereal glow, like a halo around his face. "To be honest, I don't know. It's just- something that I woke up one day, and realised. So, maybe, yeah. Though I've never been a great believer in the whole - this is your destiny, crap." 

"Even after the digiworld?" Taichi interjected with a slightly bewildered smile. 

"I think we make our own destiny," Yamato continued, as if Taichi hadn't spoken. "And we believe what we believe, but we can change it. If I ever met a girl I fell in love with, I know that I would make myself change." He smiled, a brief quirk upwards of his mouth. "But, from many empirical observations, I think it's just guys I'm physically attracted to." 

"What sort of guys?" Hikari just grinned at him. Yamato recognised that hell bent grin. It meant she wouldn't give up until he'd said what she wanted to hear. Which, consequently, could be anything. 

"Isn't that a little personal, sis?" Taichi butted in, before Yamato could answer. "Just 'cause we know we can ask him anything and he'll answer truthfully doesn't mean we should abuse that." 

Chastened, Hikari was about to lower her head when she saw the mischievous look in her brother's dancing brown eyes. 

"That's something for you to do later, eh?" Hikari asked knowledgeably. 

"You got it," Taichi said glibly. 

"That's no fair. You get all the fun," Sora protested, rummaging around the Yagami hamper for something vaguely edible looking. She eventually came out with some sort of cake, and started to unwrap it. 

"That's usually the general sort of plan I come up with, I will admit," Taichi said. He looked slowly at Yamato, and Yamato groaned. 

"Oh, great. You've unleashed a monster, Daisuke," he complained. 

"Thank you, thank you," Daisuke said, mock-bowing. 

"Unleashed it? More like, given it enough fuel for a month," Takeru remarked. 

"It's still not fair," Sora grumbled. "We should at least get a few more questions." 

Yamato held up his hands, relenting. "Okay, fine. You get one each. Apart," he added, "from Taichi, who gets one now, and then gets to ask more _after_ the video." He scowled. "I will not sit through another horror movie with him yapping like a dachshund all the way through it." 

"I do _not_ yap like a dachshund," Taichi said hotly, flushing when he realised Yamato was joking. 

"Oooh, me first, me first." Hikari put her hand up like they were still in school. "Um. Have you ever had a boyfriend?" 

Yamato blinked. "Not yet. Not really." At Hikari's frown, he decided to explain. "I mean, I went to a party once. You know," he added, twisting his head to glance at Taichi, "the one at Hiyoshi's house." 

"I remember it well," Taichi said airily, rising his eyebrows slowly and letting them fall, as if to indicate there was a lot went on at that particular party. 

"Anyway, we all got very drunk. I think I kissed one of the guys at that party." He flushed. "In the bathroom." 

"Classy, Ishida," Daisuke commented. "Any idea of who the guy was?" 

Yamato shook his head slowly. "Not a clue. Could have been Iori's grandpa for all I know." 

"Could you _please_ refrain from that sort of comment?" Iori asked plaintively. "I have enough problems not laughing at grandpa as it is for Daisuke's raspberry bath comment." 

Iori frowned as Daisuke looked inordinately pleased with himself. 

"And that counts as your question, Iori," Yamato said with a smirk. "And you, Daisuke." 

"So what type of guy do you go for?" Koushiro said, obviously unable to think of any original question. Yamato knew Koushiro still had problems with social situations, and was grateful the redhead was trying. 

"Usually the straight kind," Yamato joked, eliciting a laugh from the group. He chuckled along with them for a bit. "Just- anyone who can deal with me being me, and can be themselves, and- can carry an argument, and not let that argument be the be all and end all of things." 

He shared a soft smile with Takeru, who was obviously also remembering the less than amicable arguments between their parents. 

"You won't change?" Jyou asked briefly. 

"Haven't so far, have I?" Yamato questioned back rhetorically. "I'm still the same person. I'm still the guy that'll beat the shit out of Taichi every week and knows all his ticklish spots. I'm still the guy that'll cook in a pink apron 'cause it was his mothers. I'm still me." He grinned suddenly. "I'm still the coolest one of the gang, and you all know it." 

"No autographs, please," Takeru joked, mocking his brother's occasional swaggering style of speech. 

"Are you, y'know, _after _anyone at the moment?" Sora asked bluntly, curious. 

Yamato blushed slightly, then shook his head. "Not really." At Sora's disappointed groan, he decided to take pity on the auburn-haired girl and explain. "There's the _hope _of someone. That's enough for me right now." 

"C'mon, Taichi, only you left now," Hikari said, her voice sing-song as she goaded her brother on to commit mischief. Taichi, however, looked abruptly pensive until a slow smile crossed his face. 

Yamato groaned inwardly and pushed himself upwards to slightly face Taichi, slightly dreading the question. He couldn't decipher Taichi's expression at all, shaded as it was by leafy shadows from above. He felt his throat constricted and his mouth felt dry. 

"Yamato," Taichi said finally. "I wasn't drunk at Hiyoshi's party, you were, because Takaishi spiked the punch." 

Yamato blinked at him confused. 

Taichi looked dubious for a second, then determination swept over his face. "You know that guy you kissed at Hiyoshi's party?" 

Yamato swallowed. "Y-yes?"

"Did you know it was me?" 

Suddenly the whole world went silent, blurred into a smudge of colour. Nothing was clear except Taichi's face, inverted in the shadows, definite, exact. He could barely feel anything. His fingers felt alien to him. 

Images of the party danced through his mind, skittering like an antelope, then memories of the kiss. Memories he'd worked so hard to push away, to hide, because he knew- he knew if he kept them alive, he'd never be able to look his friend in the face any more. 

Inevitably, he had to answer. "Yes," Yamato breathed, his voice subdued as he looked down at his trousers, streaked in grass stains. "Yes, I knew it was you." 

And when he looked up, Taichi was _there_. Closer. Eyes the colour of wood hovering near his, steady, warm, welcoming. Yamato tried to swallow, and couldn't. Taichi smiled at him, and it was like light itself was smiling at him. Yamato barely felt the hand on his chin, and his vision shattered as warm lips touched his. 

Taichi's mouth moved barely perceptibly against his own, and Yamato leant gratefully into the familiar warmth, tentatively lifting his own arm, his hand alighting somewhere near Taichi's hip. The other boy winced, and Yamato pulled away instantly, concern blazing over his features. 

"Do your ribs still hurt?" Yamato spoke the question hesitantly, as if it would shatter the moment. 

Taichi smiled, brilliance incarnate. "Not any more."  
  
Someone coughed, and that sound did shatter the moment, because Taichi moved, flustered but grinning, looking sheepishly at the others. Yamato shifted his hand to move himself, and realised it was still on Taichi's leg. Reluctant to remove it, he looked up at the others through a heavy curtain of hair. 

"So. Um. Taichi." Sora spluttered a little. "_Both_ of you? So unfair. So, so unfair." 

"Why didn't you say anything, Taichi?" Takeru tilted his head, as if he was wondering whether or not to smack Taichi for kissing his brother. He took one glance at Hikari, which didn't go unnoticed except for oblivious Hikari herself, and obviously decided on inaction. 

Taichi paused, looking undecided. 

"It's a genuine question," Yamato managed, finding it hard to use his voice. His heart was pounding like a jackhammer against his own ribs, and he had the vague suspicion that he might have just fulfilled his entire purpose in life. 

Taichi nodded slowly, and pulled Yamato's face towards his own, in willful defiance of the others looking on. "You know," he said glibly, his shallow voice betrayed by the happiness on his face. A sudden smirk crossed his face and Yamato winced as he waited for the impact. "You just had to ask," Taichi said, teasing, his voice light on Yamato's face. 

Taichi's face moved closer to his own, and Yamato pulled back with an answering smirk. 

"Taichi," he said slowly, deliberately. "Are you gay?" 

"Does it matter?" Taichi asked fleetingly as he pulled Yamato in and kissed his answer, small kisses fluttering over Yamato's lips.

"I think," Yamato whispered slowly, "that was the right answer, Yagami."

"I think," Taichi said, ignoring Yamato's unrestrained giggle as the blond fought to restrain several sarcastic interludes, "that you should shut up, Ishida."

"Might be the best idea you've had all your life," Yamato agreed.

When they emerged from Taichi rather enthusiastically 'agreeing' with Yamato, the other digidestined had run, the only evidence that they'd been there the red checkered blanket that the two were still sat on.

"Way to clear the picnic site," Yamato congratulated, moving into a more comfortable position, with Taichi settled on Yamato's knees and his arms around Taichi's neck. He nuzzled Taichi's neck slightly, and pulled back looking rather blushed. Another smirk wound it's way onto Yamato's face. "One more question."

"_Yama_," Taichi protested sullenly.

"Do you think it would work emptying your house?"

"That," Taichi said emphatically, "may have been the best idea you've had all _your_ life."

Yamato shook his head. "I don't think so."

"You saying I'm wrong?"

"What, you think I'd pass up such an opportunity to say so?" Yamato laughed. "Naa, that's not it. The best idea I ever had was..." _Falling in love with you_, Yamato thought languidly, the feelings thrilling him. _Better save that particular bombshell for later._

"The truth." Taichi's eyes sparkled. "You totally deserved the crest of friendship, Yamato. Your dedication to that brought us here. To the truth." He kissed Yamato again, a little harder now.

"And your courage. Always your damned courage." Yamato touched Taichi's face in wonder. "How could we not do this before?"

"We could have," Taichi said quickly, dragging Yamato to his feet and picking up the blanket, obviously wanting to try out his 'clearing the area' talent on his own home. Something indefinable sparkled on Taichi's face that warmed Yamato's heart. "Anytime."

"Let me guess," Yamato said dryly. "I just had to ask?"

"Damn, boy, I think you're definitely the brains of this little operation."

"Really?" Yamato's eyes lit up. "What do you think about _this_ idea then?"

Yamato leant over, whispered a few choice words into Taichi's ear and pulled away. Taichi's eyes widened, and he doggedly kept up with Yamato, a brilliant flush covering his cheeks.

"Okay, okay, I was wrong. _That_ was definitely the best idea you've had all your life," Taichi admitted.

"You shouldn't say something like that unless you've heard every idea I've ever had and will continue to have," Yamato chided softly, not meaning it in a nasty or sarcastic manner at all.  
  
"I kind of plan to," Taichi said, the abrupt confidence in his words slamming Yamato in the gut. Taichi looked abruptly nervous then, and fidgeted with the sleeves of his uniform. "That is, I mean, if you want to."

Taichi was surprised by Yamato suddenly spinning him around. The blond kissed him ferverently, and Taichi let himself be swept away in the urgency, in the wonder, that this was _them_ and this was _now_.

"I want to," Yamato avowed firmly, surprising himself with his certainty on the matter. He'd never been so certain about anything. He never wanted to be so certain again. "I definitely want to."

"So how about this groping thing you promised then, huh? Or are you all words, no action?"

"You deliberately have to wind me up, don't you?"

"Ya sure, you bet ya." A sudden, nervous: "You complainin'?"

"Not at all." A laugh. Love interchanged in an unacknowledged glance. An amazed smile. "Not at all." 

-----


End file.
